Procrastinating on nano. Currently at around 12.5K, should probably be quite a bit higher. Doubt I'll get more writing done tonight. Maybe tomorrow night? But I might have plans for tomorrow night. Definitely hoping to get all caught up on Sunday.

Procrastinating on nano. Currently at around 12.5K, should probably be quite a bit higher. Doubt I'll get more writing done tonight. Maybe tomorrow night? But I might have plans for tomorrow night. Definitely hoping to get all caught up on Sunday.

If it makes you feel better, I'm at a little over 3,000- just about 7 pages of work.

I had to kick my own asparagus the other day and make myself write. There's no reason not to!

Even though I accidentally drowned my poor old laptop in coffee (it's working again today!!), I got such a lot done. I could borrow a nice little laptop with a keyboard that felt very comfortable, so I could type really fast.

I'm over 50%!

Still, I have so much to catch up on. My course materials were on my hard drive, so there's a lot to do in the next couple of days.

Got all caught up with nano! But would like to start pulling ahead by tiny increments. Hopefully writing 2k tonight. But we'll see since I have to get my bike fixed, cook & do laundry as well. Blah humbug.

This is probably only open to Canadian writers, but there's a CBC Canada Writes contest for true stories with "Close Encounters with Science". There's no entry fee, grand prize is $1000 and it's only calling for 400-500 words which is like, a page and a half. You can do that in an evening. Deadline is next week.

CBC contests always get thousands of entries so it's probably a crepe shoot to get that prize but you never know, the judges might dig what you can come up with. Also, they're restricting this to one entry per person, so that'll help keep their volume down. I've been working on my own entry the last couple of days after putting my novel time in.

This is probably only open to Canadian writers, but there's a CBC Canada Writes contest for true stories with "Close Encounters with Science". There's no entry fee, grand prize is $1000 and it's only calling for 400-500 words which is like, a page and a half. You can do that in an evening. Deadline is next week.

CBC contests always get thousands of entries so it's probably a crepe shoot to get that prize but you never know, the judges might dig what you can come up with. Also, they're restricting this to one entry per person, so that'll help keep their volume down. I've been working on my own entry the last couple of days after putting my novel time in.

61%!!! That's practically (almost) two thirds! Also found out that a topic I've been working on for some time totally fits in here as well, so I guess it's quite impossible for me to end up with too little material. Annnnnd picking up the book again.

I always remember workshops as being very creatively stimulating. I sort of always listened to the criticisms everyone has and take note of it, but the people I really tended to really listen to were are the ones who seemed to grasp what I was trying to do in the first place. If someone doesn't "get" you, or your style or the way your mind works or whatever, I never found their criticism held much value when it came to close reading, but I never dismissed them entirely because they can also notice something in a very broad stroke way that is valuable to know (in my experience). And honestly, if a professor is moderating, I've found their criticisms to be the most apt because, yeah, experience counts for a whole lot in the writing world.

I took a day off yesterday and met actual people and had brunch with them and talked about books and my friend's awesome new job (she gets to do translation for videogames) and stuff. Slowly walking back home through the cold city (with a stop at LUSH) was a nice change too.Project somewhere around 70%. Too little material never an issue.

So what's happening, folks? Catch me up on your stuff. I was looking at my novel stuff today (even though I was supposed to take the month off--but I'm enthused--good sign!) and decided that it's probably gonna have to be satire. I can't write it seriously--it would be a joke. Might as well make the joke intentional, you know? Also, what kept jumping out at me as keepers for the next revision when I skimmed the manuscript were the funny bits so I think I need to stay with that. Also, as soon as I decided it should be satire, I felt comfortable instead of anxious about it, as in before I was thinking "how am I ever gonna pull this serious shiitake off?" The thing is, I can't so I won't. I really can't be the heavy, it's just not me. We'll see though. I know I always have to keep an open mind and close no idea off at this point. It's still so early.

Even though I won't add anything new to the novel this month, I'm sure, other than ideas for the New Year, just sticking my head in there and thinking about it and seeing where I'm at is beneficial.

Even though I won't add anything new to the novel this month, I'm sure, other than ideas for the New Year, just sticking my head in there and thinking about it and seeing where I'm at is beneficial.

I'm 100% convinced this works!Did practically nothing all week (just added one or two lines so I wouldn't forget what I was thinking), but reread some things and listened to a lot of music mentioned in the books and basically always had the project at the back of my mind. Now I think/feel that I've managed to find just the right frame of mind to do this. And I think I've managed to back up all my arguments with examples. All I need to do now is to connect all my notes and scribbles and make it sound professional. So let's do this!(Oh, except I have two deadlines to meet in January, so I guess I'll be working on the smaller projects for a while and hopefully finish this big one in January/February.)

P.S. Short story rejected by 3 magazines already. Although I got lots of positive feedback from people who have read it, it doesn't seem to fit into any literary category. (fork categories.)

My stuff gets rejected all the time! I've even seen improvements in the quality of my rejection letters as progress. For example, I used to (and still sometimes do) get the photocopied rejection page with no personalized comments but now I often get encouragement from editors (though still a rejection) with a special little mention about what they think makes my work special or tell me what they like about it and one magazine is especially awesome to me and when they rejected one of my stories, the head editor of the mag sent me a full handwritten page saying that she would consider the story again if I expanded it, etc., and had all these specific suggestions as to what her readers wanted and how I could amend my story to her readershioop and I was just so touched that even though it was a rejection that she took the time to do that. And I could tell from her remarks she read the story carefully and and with great insight, like she knew exactly what I was trying to do as a writer with it and so that was amazing. That's the kind of help from editors and critical types I'm always on the lookout for. (I appreciate her advice and agree with it but I actually like the story as it is so I have continued to send it out and it keeps getting rejected. It's under consideration somewhere now but I expect it will be rejected there too. I actually plan to expand the idea into a novel but I don't really want to work on it as a short story any further anyhoo).

It's the folks who can keep brushing themselves off and get right back up on the horse that get published eventually (at least in the short story/poetry literary magazine type world). Rejections get much easier in time. I used to be bummed for a couple of days when I got a rejection, then for an afternoon and now when I get rejection you could ask me an hour after the rejection came from what story/poem it was for and what magazine it was and I've already forgotten because I'm already focusing on what I can do to improve the work and where it can go next for consideration. Onward! You do grow a callus and get tough to it. I think when I finish my novel those rejections will live with me a little longer and maybe a little harder as the amount of work that's going to go into the damn thing.